You Won’t Believe it — Connecticut’s Not Half Bad

CT’s US News ‘best state’ ranking nosedives

Connecticut has plummeted to a ranking of 24th best state in the nation for 2018 from a perch of 12th last year, according to the latest 2018 study from U.S. News & World Report.This year, the state’s middle-of-the-pack assessment is dragged down by poor performance in economic growth, affordability and infrastructure.

Iowa is ranked the country’s best state, and is also No. 1 for fiscal stability, followed by Minnesota, and then Wisconsin. At the other end of the spectrum, New Mexico, followed by Mississippi and finally, Louisiana, round out the bottom three.

The 2018 rankings are based on 77 metrics and tens of thousands of data points provided by McKinsey & Co.’s Leading States Index covering eight areas: economy, fiscal stability, education, infrastructure, crime and corrections, health care, opportunity and quality of life. In determining the weights of the eight categories, McKinsey’s used two years of data from its “citizen experience” survey, which asked more than 30,000 people to prioritize each subject in their state and provide levels of satisfaction with government services.